


and why i've spent my whole life trying to put it into words

by peterpan_in_neverland



Series: lyrically inclined [5]
Category: Never Have I Ever (TV)
Genre: Cunnilingus, F/M, MY LONGEST NHIE FIC EVER, Oral Sex, Smut, Vaginal Fingering, Vaginal Sex, WOOOOOOOOOO LETS GO, based on "You Are In Love" by Taylor Swift, falling in love fic, i spent way too much time in my life on this fic, oh my God who am i, part of the lyrically inclined series, relationships, so many words, this is such a long fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:27:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27753067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peterpan_in_neverland/pseuds/peterpan_in_neverland
Summary: “French fries are meant to be dipped in mayo,” he says, furrowing his brow, deliberately scooping more mayonnaise onto his fries than he had before.“I’m sure you could say the same about dirt. Or, like, water from the Thames,” she says, and Paxton snorts, rolling his eyes, “just because it’s tradition, doesn’t mean it’s good.”“Okay, but this is actually good.”“No way.”“Have you ever tried it?” he asks, and she falters.“No, I have not,” Eleanor admits, and Paxton holds his hands up in a see? gesture, “but, that doesn’t mean that my taste in food is worse than yours—”“— also doesn’t mean that it’s better—”“— or that I’m wrong—”“— you are, though—”“— it just means that I have an impeccable palette based on sight alone.”“Or,” Paxton says, and holds up his finger, on one hand, using the other to dip a french fry in his cup of mayo, “it means that you’re too much of a coward to try something new, especially because you don’t want to be wrong.”--OR; Paxton and Eleanor run into each other at the Sherman Oaks class of 2023 reunion
Relationships: Paxton Hall-Yoshida/Eleanor Wong
Series: lyrically inclined [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1909363
Comments: 8
Kudos: 15





	and why i've spent my whole life trying to put it into words

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cori_the_bloody](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cori_the_bloody/gifts), [magnetichearts](https://archiveofourown.org/users/magnetichearts/gifts), [flashlightinacave](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flashlightinacave/gifts), [goldcarnations](https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldcarnations/gifts).



> This fic took approximately one million years to write. I hope you enjoy it. I few things:
> 
> 1) I used google translate for the Japanese used in this fic, so if there are any errors that any Japanese-speaking people that have any remarks or suggestions, feel free to leave them!  
> 2) I am truly combining my two worlds here: Broadway and NHIE, and honestly? I am not upset about it. I love it.  
> 3) This fic is 16K words and as always, I did not proofread it. I just never have it in me when I finish a fic. It is probably not a good habit.  
> 4) I think this is possibly the latest hour that I have ever posted a fic at. So, do with that information what you will.
> 
> Now, onto the dedications:
> 
> Bhargavi: Thank you, my love, for encouraging my ideas and being excited for the different word count updates I had to deliver. You kept me going on this, and I appreciate you forever for it  
> Cori: Hi hon! Y'know those fun talks that we have about NHIE and different theories and stuff? Yeah, usually when we have them, I am writing something. They spurn me on and make me happy and honestly, they motivate me to keep writing you, and I appreciate that more than you will ever know  
> Leila: Leila my sweetheart science nerd, I love you so. Your science facts make me smile, almost as much as you do, and I thank you eternally for being my friend (and for telling me that scientists are lowkey obsessed with Sonic the hedgehog, that fact means everything to me)  
> Maggie: I know you're off living your vampiric lifestyle dream, and I want to say that I am crazy proud of you. Thank you for inventing the ship that allowed me to write this fic. It wouldn't have been possible without ya, babe, and I love you so so much.
> 
> I love you all very, very dearly, and I am so glad to call you my friends. Je vous aime tous.

Eleanor hates Sherman Oaks.

Sherman Oaks is where her mother abandoned her twice, where her childhood pets died, where Sharon— stupid, basic Sharon— told her that Juilliard would never work out, and where Eleanor had the first heartbreak of her life. And, yet, here she is, sipping from a gross, poorly mixed mai tai, leaning against a makeshift bar and scanning the faces of all the people she went to high school with. 

Oliver had lost the baby fat that filled in the hollow of his cheeks, and Alex Martinez had gotten taller somewhere in between senior year and community college— it seems like everyone has gotten taller than her, somehow, and she stamps her foot on the ground. Just to do it, just to see how it feels. 

“Dramatic,” Fabiola whispers, and eases the mai tai from between Eleanor’s fingers, “though, that does track for you. Why’re you drinking a mai tai?”

“Cheaper than a cosmopolitan,” Eleanor answers, and shrugs, whining when Fabiola holds the drink above her head.

“There's lemongrass in this— you  _ hate _ that.”

“I definitely don’t enjoy it, but I am doing a lot of things I don’t enjoy tonight.”

“I take that to mean that you’re considering going home with Oliver?” Fabiola asks, disapproving, before lowering the drink back into Eleanor’s hands.

“Why wouldn’t I? This whole night is, more or less, a punishment from God for whatever atrocious sins I’ve committed.” She sips on the drink, and grimaces, screwing up her face and sticking out her tongue at the force of the lemongrass. “Why not round it out with a poorly considered hookup with my high school sweetheart who, coincidentally, broke my heart right before college?”

“That sounds less like God punishing you and more like you punishing you,” Fabiola says, and turns back around to the bar, ordering a glass of whiskey.

“Y’know, every time you order a whiskey, I am reminded of a little ditty—”

“— don’t sing Carrie Underwood at me—”

“— buying her a fruity little drink cause she can't shoot whiskey,” Eleanor deadpans, her heart not in it enough to truly sing. 

“You’re lucky I love you too much to hate you,” Fabiola says, tipping her head back and letting the whiskey slide down her throat. Eleanor grimaces.

“I’ll probably hate you by the end of the night when you go home with Eve and I go home to my diploma and a dog that likes me a lot less than dogs should,” Eleanor says, and shrugs. Fabiola clicks her tongue and tilts her head to let it rest on top of Eleanors. “You’re gonna squish your curls.”

“I’d let my curls get squished for you  _ any _ day of the week, El.”

“But you spent so much time making them look perfectly curly-fied!” Eleanor protests, and ducks her head, pulling her shoulders down so Fabiola’s head hovers midair before she pulls herself up straight.

“Perfectly curly-fied for _ this, _ that is,” Fabiola says, and shrugs, tracing her ring finger around the rim of the shot glass before setting it back down on the counter, “extremely not worth it.”

“Says the girl with the woman and the cat,” Eleanor says, bitter as dark chocolate, and considers dumping the mai tai over the top of her head, just to see how it would feel. Maybe she’d look hot, lemongrass strips hanging in her hair. She sets the glass down to stop herself.

“What does that mean?” Fabiola asks, looking gently offended.

“Just that you have something worthwhile to look good for,” Eleanor says, and shrugs, “I always look downright fantastic and have no one around to admire it.” 

“You have me,” Fabiola protests, placing a hand over her chest, acting more insulted than she is, “and your dog!”

“Brighton has no sense of style.” 

“Very odd for a canine owned by you.” 

Eleanor opens her mouth to reply, but cuts herself off when Eve reappears, looping her arms around Fabiola’s waist— she’s shorter than Fabiola by a few inches, so her forehead rests at the base of Fabiola’s neck. Eleanor swoons for them, despite herself. 

“So… Gabriela convinced me to go to Antonio’s for spaghetti, and since I have this super cute girlfriend with a weakness for marinara sauce, I figured I’d see if you want to come?” Eve asks, and Fabiola sighs, happy, grabbing Eve's hand and pulling her around, so Eve faces her.

“I’m always down for marinara sauce,” Fabiola answers, and looks over the top of Eve’s head at Eleanor. “You’ll be okay if I go, right— I know you don’t like Antonio’s.” 

“I will be absolutely horrible and will have no choice but to collapse dramatically on the dance floor to get someone’s attention,” Eleanor answers, and Fabiola nods.

“So, what I’m hearing is, you’re gonna finish your gross, unappealing mai tai and go back to your hotel?” Fabiola says, raising an eyebrow in a way that says  _ grow up, Eleanor.  _

“Yeah, probably.” She shrugs. “Except I’m going to order another mai tai— so the lesson really hits home.” 

“Your mai tai of despair is on me, then,” Eve says, and pulls a twenty-dollar bill out of her pocket, slipping it into Eleanor’s purse before she can even process the swiftness of the movement. She turns back to Fabiola. “You ready, Lola?” 

“I’m always ready for marinara,” Fabiola says and steals a peck against Eve’s lips before straightening back up. “Bye, El. Make good decisions,  _ please.”  _

“Never!” 

Eleanor watches Fabiola and Eve leave the gymnasium with tamped down longing, giggling when Eve kicks the poster board sign that spells out  _ Sherman Oaks Class of 2023 Five Year Reunion  _ before disappearing out of the black double doors. 

She pulls herself up on a barstool and resists the urge to order a shot of whiskey, just to try to emulate Fabiola, before she takes another sip of her mai tai, mentally criticizing the bartender's choice to add lemongrass. 

She is fiddling with the garnish— a twisty strip of a lemon peel— and cursing her decision to show up tonight (Devi had the right idea, staying in New York), when Paxton sits heavily on the stool next to her, tapping his fingers against the lacquered surface of the bar, blowing out a breath and studying the pattern of the wood. 

“Hey,” he says, unexpectedly, and Eleanor looks up, her eyebrows scrunched.

“What?” she asks, and it comes out sharper than she intended, venomous. She blames the lemongrass. 

He rolls his eyes halfway, and looks away from her, ordering a glass of scotch with ice when the bartender comes around, and scrapes his nails against the counter. “Never mind.” 

_ “What?”  _ she repeats, anger on purpose, and he looks at her completely. Fuck, he’s more handsome now than he was then— he has filled in, his cheekbones better defined, and his jawline standing out against the shadows along his neck. His cheeks are flushed and she wonders, unbidden, if his skin would be warm against her palm, before instantly feeling disgusted with herself.

“Nothing, I just— aren’t you that girl who yelled at me junior year?” he asks, voice cringing, and scrubs his knuckles over the accumulation of stubble along his jawline.

She blinks, hard, and tries to remember yelling at him in her junior year. “I don’t,” she starts, then stops, realizing he meant  _ his  _ junior year, “oh.” 

“Thought so.” He smirks, and she wants to smack him, just a little bit. 

“You don’t have to be a dick about it, H-Y.” 

“Not trying to be,” he says, and shrugs, “though, my sister does say that unintentional dick-ness is one of my upsetting qualities.” 

The bartender sets down a short glass of scotch in front of Paxton, and he knocks back a swallow of it like a shot. Eleanor grimaces, then shakes her head, trying to gather any remaining shreds of  _ cool. _

“I didn’t know you have a sister,” Eleanor says, skipping over the vulnerability. 

“Oh.” He does not look like he expected her response like he does not know what to say. “She’s, like, two years older than me— she went to private school, which is probably why you don’t know her.” 

“Private school?”

“Yeah,” he says, and nods, studying the curves in the ice cubes drifting in his drink, “she’s super smart. Public school was too easy.” 

“Ah. Gotcha.” Eleanor sips on her mai tai, then bites the straw, feeling it crumple between her teeth.“I shouldn’t have yelled at you sophomore year.” 

“What?” he says, looking confused. The DJ changes the music, and the lights start to reverberate in a colourful pattern that makes her dizzy. The colours sink into his skin like they belong there. 

“I shouldn’t have called you a racist,” she says, then snorts at the drama of it all, “my mom lied about not being in town, so…” 

“That’s why you said I was starting a rumour!” he exclaims, loud, snapping his fingers and exhaling gravelly, like a content sigh. “That has seriously been bothering me for, like, seven years.” 

Eleanor snorts, and stirs her drink, before getting brave and tipping the rest of it back into her throat. “Ugh,” she says, and sticks out her tongue, shaking her head quickly. “Wait, why didn’t you just… ask?” 

“Would’ve been awkward.”

“And this hasn’t been?” she asks, motioning between them. “I mean, do you even know my name?”

“Of course I do,” he says, and frowns, “it’s Eleanor.” 

The way he says her name hits her directly in the chest— he says it like he is British, shaping the  _ or  _ into an  _ er,  _ and it sends her heart fluttering. “Oh.”

“What?” 

“Nothing,” she says, and smiles. The corner of his lips tilt up, and it is just  **one look** in a  **dark room,** but she cannot shake the feeling that it was  **meant just for her.**

“It has to be  _ something,” _ he responds, turning in the stool so that he faces her, completely, the wings of his shoulders turned down in her direction. 

“I just didn’t think you knew what my name was, she says, “especially since you aren’t in my graduating class— what are you even  _ doing  _ here, dude?” She adds the last part as a distraction because she  _ hates  _ being that girl, the one who is surprised and pleased when the pretty, popular dream boy knows her name. 

“Trent graduated with you guys,” he answers and does not say anything else, not even about her shock at his awareness of her name.

“So, you’re here with him, then?” she asks, extrapolating. 

“Yep,” he says, and shrugs. “It’s pretty much exactly what I thought a Sherman Oaks reunion would be like.” 

“Yeah,” she says, and sighs, trailing her fingertips against the rim of her empty glass. 

“Yeah.” He rubs at the back of his neck, then taps his nails against the bartop heavily. Eleanor watches him with mild interest, letting her eyes skate over his frame and dissect his fidgets. He cannot seem to sit still, some part of him always bouncing or tapping, and she has to fight the urge to reach out and smooth her thumb along his knuckles, just to get him to relax. 

“Hey,” he says, after a moment of silence, and she snaps her gaze away from his hands, looking at his eyes instead. They are a pretty hazel colour, and somehow, they make his cheekbones look all the more striking. “D'you wanna get out of here?” 

Her breath catches. She looks from him, to the dance floor, and back to the lingering dregs on her mai tai, and finally, back at him. He is grinning. Grinning like he knows the answer to all her problems. How to discover and dissect and solve each and every one.

“Okay.

* * *

“Y’know, when you said  _ let’s get out of here,”  _ Eleanor says, pitching her voice low in a cheap intimidation of Paxton and sliding into a booth, “I really didn’t think you meant McDonald’s as our destination.” 

“How could you  _ not  _ expect McDonald’s?” he asks, sounding almost offended, “McDonald’s is extremely fine dining.”

“McDonald’s is… the home of blended meat,” Eleanor says, and laughs, despite herself, and taps her fingernails against the table— it lights up under her fingers, and she pulls her hands back in shock. Paxton laughs, and swipes a flat hand over it, grinning broadly.

“And the place you go when your high school reunion sucks,” Paxton adds, and shrugs, swiping his fingers over the table, drawing patterns. When one of the cashiers calls their order number, Paxton gets up, slipping out of the booth easily, and Eleanor watches him walk.

There was always something about Paxton that made Eleanor want to study him, to figure him out. He reminded her of a method actor, in the worst way, the kind that takes the roles and the parts given to him and lives with them for the rest of his life, and she tries not to linger on what might be resting on his back. 

The line of his shoulders, even, looks tired, anxious.

She had not noticed it until they walked into the restaurant, but his cheeks look less defined and more drawn. Part of her, a little bit, wants to offer to buy him groceries, or make meals. Casseroles for the hurting and soup for the hungry, her father used to tell her, and Paxton seems like he is a little bit of both.

He sets the greasy bag down in front of her, and she traces her fingers over the golden arches printed on the bag, before ripping it down the center and folding the bag out into a plate. 

Paxton dips three french fries at once in a plastic cup of mayo, and Eleanor sets out her food while he does it, and all at once, it feels like  **time moves too fast.**

“Y’know what’s crazy?” Eleanor asks, watching him tear the wrapper from his burger into thin, equally sized strips. a grade stain makes one of them tear in half, and Paxton frowns. 

“What?” 

“That you like french fries with mayo.” 

“French fries are meant to be dipped in mayo,” he says, furrowing his brow, deliberately scooping more mayonnaise onto his fries than he had before. 

“I’m sure you could say the same about dirt. Or, like, water from the Thames,” she says, and Paxton snorts, rolling his eyes, “just because it’s tradition, doesn’t mean it’s  _ good.”  _

“Okay, but this is  _ actually  _ good.” 

“No way.” 

“Have you ever tried it?” he asks, and she falters. 

“No, I have not,” Eleanor admits, and Paxton holds his hands up in a  _ see?  _ gesture,  _ “but,  _ that doesn’t mean that my taste in food is worse than yours—” 

“— also doesn’t mean that it’s better—” 

“— or that I’m wrong—” 

“— you are, though—” 

“— it just means that I have an impeccable palette based on sight alone.” 

“Or,” Paxton says, and holds up his finger, on one hand, using the other to dip a french fry in his cup of mayo, “it means that you’re too much of a coward to try something new, especially because you don’t want to be wrong.” 

“Or I’m just so right that I don’t even need proof,” Eleanor says, bristled, even though she knows he likely won’t let it go with a reply like that. 

“Bullshit,” he says, drawing out the vowels, and leaning forward on his elbows. He holds the fry between his fingers like a cigarette. 

“This is peer pressure,” she says, but takes the fry regardless. 

“Or it’s proper scientific theory.” 

“Since when have you learned scientific theory?” Eleanor asks, then winces, immediately feeling rude. “Sorry, that was mean, I just… I had you in a biology class freshman year, and I don’t think you took your head up off of your desk once.” 

“People change, Ellie,” Paxton answers, and Eleanor raises an eyebrow.

“Ellie?” she repeats, and Paxton nods, “don’t call me that.”

“If you say so,” he says, and shrugs, “now, eat the fry, Wong.” 

She does, and admits that it tastes good, and Paxton’s kilowatt smile is too endearing for her to be mad. 

* * *

“So  _ you  _ were the reason that Mrs. Paloma gave us a lecture on the flammability of hair,” Paxton says, hands in his pockets, as they walk down the sidewalk towards Eleanor’s hotel. 

Part of her doesn’t want tonight to end— not a large enough part to invite him up for a nightcap and a hotel sleepover— but a part just large enough that it needs to be acknowledged, and she is most definitely going to need to call Devi and Fabiola by this time tomorrow. 

“At least it wasn’t  _ my  _ hair that got set on fire,” Eleanor says, shrugging, “these luscious locks need to be preserved.”

“I’m glad it wasn’t your hair that had to burn, then,” Paxton says, and stops in front of her hotel, leaning against a pillar. “I had fun.”

“So did I,” Eleanor replies, and looks down at her feet, fiddling with the  **buttons on her coat,** and grasping for some way to make this last longer. “Even though it was a shitty reunion and McDonald’s.” 

“But you got to try French fries with mayo on them,” he points out, smiling at her with the corner of his mouth, “that has to make it more than completely worth it.” 

“Yeah, whatever you say, H-Y,” she laughs, and scuffs her shoe against the concrete, shoving her hands in her pockets. “I should probably get in.” 

His face falls a millimeter, and she tries to convince herself that she imagined it. “Yeah, yeah, it’s late, so… yeah.” 

“Yeah,” she repeats, and does not move, “thanks for… y’know, everything.” 

“Yeah, I had fun.” He smiles, and she lets herself begin to walk away, before he catches at her elbow, spinning her back around to face him. 

It happens awkwardly: her fight or flight instinct lands on  _ freeze,  _ and her body goes rigid without the approval of her conscious and Paxton is looking at her with a cocktail of emotions that Eleanor is not sure how to parse out, and it does not seem like he is about to say anything, so she says, “yeah?” 

“Could I get your number?” he asks her, and she is so wholly unexpecting of this moment, that she takes a step backward, her arm slipping out of his grip. The place where his fingers laid is warm, even through her coat, and it raises goosebumps over her entire body when the wind hits her just right. 

“Oh,” she says, and blinks, pulling her phone from the pocket of her dress, “yeah, um… I’m sorry, I just, I didn’t know  _ what  _ I thought you were gonna ask, but this really wasn’t high up on the list— I honestly would’ve expected a  _ can I come in  _ before a  _ can I get your number  _ but I like the one you chose a lot more.” 

“Yeah,” he says, and laughs, though he sounds a little uneasy. Eleanor damns her rambling. She gives him her numbers and he gives her his, even letting her take a picture of him to set as the contact photo. 

“Your turn,” he says, and Eleanor pushes her eyebrows together, smiling faintly, trying to make herself say  _ my turn for what?  _ when the camera flash goes off and she realizes that  _ oh, he wanted to take my picture,  _ and she tries not to scream. “You look good.” 

“Oh, I definitely don’t,” she says and covers her face with one hand. She can see Paxton pouting from in between her fingers, and the sight is so adorable that it makes her heart beat faster. 

“Yes, you do, Eleanor,” he says, and smiles— a real smile, the kind that makes his eyes crinkle at the corners and his dimples appear in his cheeks. It makes him look younger, less drawn, so much happier. 

“Thank you,” she says, and the acceptance feels strange in her chest. “I really should get back to my room, though. My joints are beginning to protest all of the walking.” 

“Yeah, yeah, of course,” he says, and quickly, so quickly that she almost could’ve imagined it, he leans down and presses a kiss to her cheek, the pads of his fingers brushing against the opposite side of her jaw. “Text me when you make it to your room, okay? So I know you’re alright.” 

She clears her throat and tries to kill any blooms of a blush in her cheeks and on her chest. “Y-Yeah, of course, Paxton.” 

He nods, and skates his fingers down her arm, and turns away, walking along the sidewalk. Eleanor watches him until the darkness swallows him, and then she turns on her heel and all but sprints to the elevator, pressing the down button six times before the doors open, and she slips inside. 

She presses the button for her floor, and yanks her phone from her purse, pulling up the group chat with Devi and Fabiola. 

_ eleanor: have you guys ever made a really good mistake? like, discovery of penicillin kind of good, but if penicillin could, like, kiss you on the cheek and call you pretty???? _

_ devi: ??????? _

_ devi: these sound like the musings of a drunk bitch _

_ eleanor: the only thing im drunk on is mcdonalds sprite _

_ devi: mcdonalds sprite has to be laced w cocaine or smthn like _

_ devi: there’s no way sprite is that addictive all on its own _

_ fabiola: Why aren’t you all in bed like reasonable adults?  _

_ devi: i am actually texting from bed. ben is snoring and so is heathcliff  _

_ fabiola: Cats can snore?? _

_ devi: loudly.  _

_ eleanor: YOURE NOT GIVING ME ENOUGH ATTENTION  _

_ eleanor: the elevator is about to reach my floor— y’all better be ready to give me the attention/love/praise/advice that i deserve _

_ devi: stop using y’all, eleanor, u aren’t gay or southern _

_ fabiola: I gave her the “y’all” pass _

_ devi: dammit _

The elevator doors ping and Eleanor hunts down her room, swiping the card four times before it finally works, and slamming the door shut as soon as she walks in. 

She throws her coat over a deceptively soft-looking chair that she knows feels like sand, and changes into her pajamas as quickly as possible before flinging herself backward onto her bed. 

_ eleanor: first of all fabiola lee torres fuck u for abandoning me for marinara sauce _

_ devi: traitorous behavior  _

_ fabiola: And I’d do it again!  _

_ eleanor: second of all thank u for abandoning me for marinara sauce _

_ devi: i just gasped out loud  _

_ devi: i love a good twist _

_ devi: especially one that involves marinara sauce _

_ fabiola: It was fucking amazing marinara sauce _

_ eleanor: sTOP talking about the marinara sauce and pay attention to meeeeeeee!!  _

_ fabiola: I am reluctantly shutting up abt the marinara sauce  _

_ eleanor: guess who was at the reunion that fabiola abandoned and devi didn’t go to???? _

_ devi: if you say nick jonas, then im jumping out the window _

_ eleanor: p a x t o n _

_ devi: STILL GOING OUT THE WINDOW _

_ fabiola: Devi stop _

_ devi: ugh fine _

_ devi: wait so how does this relate to penicillin?? _

_ eleanor: it relates to penicillin because im pretty sure we went on a date?? _

_ fabiola: God I hate straight people _

_ devi: are you fucking KIDDING me?????? _

_ eleanor: ,,, should i be fucking kidding you?? _

_ fabiola: Seems that way _

_ eleanor: but it was kind of a good date though!! he was super nice and funny?  _

_ devi: of course he grows a personality after i get over him  _

_ fabiola: That's the way the cookie crumbles I guess  _

_ eleanor: he kissed my cheek and asked for my number and walked me to my hotel??? and he got mcdonalds?? which usually would be a huge turnoff but it was like,,, endearing? and charming? and i am So Confused _

_ fabiola: You and me both Eleanor  _

_ devi: im gonna have to get drunk  _

_ fabiola: Or you could develop a healthy coping mechanism _

_ devi: nah id rather get shitfaced  _

_ eleanor: HELLO _

_ eleanor: i need guidance!!!! _

_ eleanor: should i text him?? _

_ eleanor: should i change my name and number and flee the country??? _

_ eleanor: oh fuck he asked me to text him when i made it to my room _

_ eleanor: i forgot shit fuck why am i the way that i am _

_ fabiola: Then you should probably do that _

_ fabiola: So he doesn’t think you got like… murdered  _

_ eleanor: good plan good plan  _

_ eleanor: actually im gonna call him don’t stop me _

_ devi: oh how the mighty hath fallen _

_ eleanor: shut up _

She closes her text chain with Devi and Fabiola, and scrolls through her contacts list, clicking on Paxton’s. She hesitates, looking at the photo of him she took for his contact— he winks at her through the screen— and she tries to convince herself that this is a bad idea. 

She clicks on the call button anyway. 

“Hey,” Paxton says, picking up, and she hears a metallic jingling in the background, “what’s up? Is everything okay?” 

“Oh, yeah, I just…” she trails off, and searches for a reason as to why she would be calling him, “I just wanted to tell you that, I… I live in New York now.” 

He laughs softly. “Yeah?” 

“Yeah, I’m working on Broadway— crew stuff, running tech, a lot of boring, menial kind of work.” 

“So, the city, huh?” he asks, and she hears the sound of box springs. And something static-y, like sports coverage, and she tries not to picture him sitting in bed watching ESPN recaps. 

“Yeah, I always really wanted to live there and Broadway is magical and it’s always kind of been a dream, so…” she trails off, and shrugs. “Anyway, what’re you doing?” 

“Like, right now? Or in general?” 

“Both.” 

“Right now, I am talking to you,” he tells her, and even though she  _ knows  _ it is the truth, it sends a warm tingle down her spine. 

“What’s on TV?” she asks, “I can hear it in the background.” 

“Baseball stats and stuff,” he answers, and then chuckles, “not really paying attention, though— I’m not really a big baseball guy.” 

“Swimming is more your speed.” 

“Always and forever.” 

“What do you do for work?” she asks, and bites at her lip, rolling over to look at the hotel alarm clock.  _ Eleven twenty-four.  _ Jesus. 

“I teach, and coach the swim team,” he says, and Eleanor bites back a laugh, “you can laugh, I know, it’s insane,” he tells her, laughing himself, like a  **lighthearted joke.**

“It’s just… kind of hard to picture you teaching.” 

“That’s what my sister said— except she was meaner about it.” 

“You really love your sister, huh?” Eleanor asks and smiles, a little sad. She would have killed to have a sibling growing up. Someone who understood what it felt like to have her mom leave and lie and make excuses. 

“She’s my best friend,” Paxton answers, and she can picture him shrugging, his shoulders saying,  _ isn’t it obvious?  _

“That’s nice,” Eleanor tells him and means it. “What school do you teach at? Sherman Oaks?”

“Nah,” he says, “didn’t feel like staying there.” 

“Oh. Where, then?” 

“This school in New York— kind of underfunded, more than, like… average schools. But I love it.” 

“You-You live in New York?” she asks, cringing when her voice catches. She did not realize she had been hoping for him to say that until now. 

“Yeah,” he says, “probably pretty close to you, if you live near Broadway.” 

“Fuck.”

“Uh-huh.” 

“I cannot believe I haven’t, like, run into you,” Eleanor says, even though she knows the odds of seeing him in the city are low. 

“It was nice seeing you tonight, though,” he says, sending a warm feeling through her stomach, “and to get an apology for calling me racist.” 

“I probably should’ve apologized for that sooner. Maybe posted it on my story and tagged you, or something,” she says, laughter in her voice and Paxton laughs in a rumble that vibrates through the phone and shoots along her bones. 

“Oh yeah, because that’s good apology quality.”

“Impeccable,” she says, and yawns, shaking her head to clear the incoming clouds of sleep.

“You’re tired, huh?” 

“Sleep is my enemy,” Eleanor answers, pulling the heavy white hotel comforter to her shoulders, “I snore.” 

“Very endearing,” he says, and she hears his TV click off, “go to sleep.” 

“That’s only for the weak.”

“It’s for the reasonable,” he says, and Eleanor smiles, despite herself. She has yet to take her makeup off, and she does not think she will be able to make herself get up to do it. 

“Fine,” she groans, drawing out the  _ i.  _ “I wanna see you again.” 

He is quiet for a beat too long, and she starts to worry. “If you still want that in the morning, then text me, okay?” 

“Mhm,” she hums, “g’night, Pax.” 

“Night, Eleanor.”

* * *

_ eleanor: i still want that _

_ paxton: i’ll pick you up in two hours?  _

_ eleanor: one _

_ paxton: one it is _

* * *

“Are you pro or con on sprinkles?” Eleanor asks, chewing on the stir stick that came with her coffee. 

“Like… in general?” he asks, his brows furrowed. He walks with one hand stuffed in the pocket of his jeans, the other holding his coffee, and she wants to reach out and trace the veins in the back of his hand. 

“Hmm… both for taste and decorative purposes,” she says, and he nods, taking a sip of his coffee. 

“For decorative purposes, fantastic, ten out of ten,” he says, and Eleanor nods appreciatively, “lower on taste, like, six out of ten.” 

_ “Six?”  _ Eleanor asks, incredulously. “Perhaps I should be rethinking this.” 

“What  _ are  _ you thinking about this?” Paxton asks, the depth of his question tricked by his persistent and deceptive casualness. 

“I’m thinking… that this is some fantastic coffee,” she says, even though the coffee is barely subpar, and Paxton’s smile falters when he looks at her. 

It’s just  **one look, not much, but** to her,  **it says enough.**

“And, I’m thinking that I enjoy your company,” she says, and means it, reveling in the joy that explodes in her stomach when Paxton’s smile stretches skyward. “Even though you think sprinkles don’t taste good.” 

_ “Some  _ sprinkles taste good,” he says, downing the rest of his coffee before tossing the cup away in a trash can, “the ones that are basically food dye and sugar, for example.”

“Which ones  _ don’t  _ taste good, Paxton Hall-Yoshida?” she asks, entirely too indignant for a topic as ridiculous as the taste of sprinkles. 

“Those rainbow ones. Really, any sprinkles that  _ aren’t  _ the food dye and sugar ones are just straight-up horrible.” 

“You’re a disgrace.” 

“And yet, you’re having coffee with me.” 

“Yeah,” she says and takes another sip, “I guess I am.” 

“You  _ guess?”  _

She rolls her eyes at him. “And, if you’re lucky, I’m gonna want to do it again.” 

She feels his fingers brush her shoulder, and smooth down her arm. He grabs her wrist with the circle of his fingers, and turns her hand over, looking at the skin on her palm. He traces his fingertips along her skin, and it sends spirals of delicious feeling through her entire body. 

When he laces his fingers through hers, she feels herself fall apart at the seams. 

“I hope I’m lucky.” 

* * *

_ eleanor: this is an emergency i think i like paxton  _

_ devi: been there, done that, it’s your issue now  _

_ fabiola: Be a supportive friend, vishwakumar  _

_ devi: i don’t think it says anywhere in our friend contract that i have to do that _

_ fabiola: You and I both know that you break every contract you sign _

_ fabiola: Be a good friend or I'll make Gears Brosnan cut you _

_ devi: gears would never  _

_ fabiola: You. Can't. Fight. Code.  _

_ eleanor: he held my hand today and we talked bout sprinkles and i think i wanna see him again??? he made me feel really warm and idk what the hell to do with that _

_ fabiola: If you want to see him again then see him again _

_ fabiola: It really isnt that hard _

_ eleanor: what if he doesn’t want to see me though sjshdjsj HELP _

_ devi: he wouldn’t have held your hand if he didn’t like you tho _

_ eleanor: he could’ve just done it to be nice? _

_ fabiola: You’re an idiot _

_ fabiola: Wait what happens when you go back to NY? _

_ eleanor: he lives in new york  _

_ fabiola: Way to bury the lead kiddo! _

_ devi: you could completely feasibly start a relationship with him then _

_ devi: why aren’t you like ???? i do not understand  _

_ eleanor: what if it doesn’t work out??? _

_ fabiola: You can’t Juilliard everything, El _

_ eleanor: stop throwing juilliard back in my face jesus fuck _

_ fabiola: You regret not applying, I know you do, you can’t keep doing that with everything good that comes into your life  _

_ fabiola: It’s sad and it’s cowardly and it’ll leave you unfulfilled if you keep doing it _

_ fabiola: It’s not healthy and I know Devi will agree _

_ devi: i would like to be left out of this pls and thanks  _

_ eleanor: no she dropped your name now i have to know _

_ eleanor: spill vishwakumar. do you agree?  _

_ devi: yes i do _

_ devi: though ultimately i understand why you run screaming from everything good in your life _

_ devi: cause it’s easier to run screaming than to risk getting hurt but just,,, don’t you value the experiences you’ve had even when they end with u getting hurt sometimes???? _

_ eleanor: i don’t want to deal with this right now _

_ fabiola: You can’t run away from everything  _

_ fabiola: Not even confrontations about your tendency to run away from everything  _

_ fabiola: when you’re ready to talk we can talk but you can’t avoid it for forever  _

_ eleanor: watch me _

_ devi: that’s rude el _

_ eleanor: dont care  _

_ fabiola: Fine. Don’t talk to the people that support you then _

_ fabiola: Have fun telling Paxton you don’t want to see him anymore  _

_ fabiola: And don’t come to me when you’re moping around heartbroken because I’m gonna tell you it’s your own fault _

_ eleanor: fine by me _

_ fabiola: Fine _

_ devi: i hate it when mom and dad fight _

_ eleanor: SHUT UP _

_ fabiola: Be quiet Devi _

* * *

“So, what I’m hearing is… you’re ghosting him,” Devi says, yawning, and scrubbing at her face with her hands. She is trying to make coffee, but she keeps distracting herself and stopping, fiddling with the dishes laid out to dry, or looking at Eleanor disapprovingly.

Eleanor had gotten back to the city a week and a half ago, Fabiola’s words echoing through her skull and Paxtons texts haunting her, simple replies and vague answers. She has not used the letter  _ k _ this much in her life up to now, and she is beginning to resent it and herself.

“Is it ghosting if I’m replying?”

“You're replying like a boring person, though,” Devi says, pulling herself up to sit on top of the counter. The Keurig beeps at her indignantly, and she grumbles, reaching a leg up to bump it carefully. “Which can’t be fulfilling to you.” 

“Oh, for sure it’s not,” Eleanor admits, leaning heavily against Devi’s refrigerator, “but, I mean, it’s the best course of action.” 

“Is it?” Devi asks, pulling her knees to her chest. The kitchen is starting to smell like hazelnut coffee, and Eleanor knows that the smell will wake up Ben, who will shuffle into the kitchen and attempt to make the argument logical and lawyerly. 

Eleanor loves Ben, she really does, but sometimes she wants to split his skull in two. Sometimes, emotions need to be felt, not solved, and Ben needs to learn to accept that.

“I certainly don’t like it, but you can’t fight the logic,” Eleanor says, and shrugs, knocking down a crayon and coloured pencil drawing that had been hung on the fridge with a magnet. Eleanor wants to ask who drew it, but pushes the urge aside in pursuit of dealing with her issues with Paxton. 

“You can always fight logic. I fight logic daily. Ben fights logic by  _ dating  _ me, I mean, I’m way out of his league,” Devi says, and Eleanor laughs, despite the sorrow hanging over her. 

“Why do you think I should go for this?” Eleanor asks, and picks up the drawing, hanging it back on the fridge. A bright orange cat smiles at her, and the corner of the photo says  _ for Devi Auntie!  _ in blocky lettering. 

Kamala’s daughter. Of course. 

“I think you should go for it because it’s obvious that he makes you insanely, absurdly, without-good-reason happy.”

“Without good reason?” Eleanor echoes, worry spiraling through her, grasping her like a cold hand in the dark. 

“It’s all very opposites attract,” Devi says, and shrugs, “you don’t make sense, but you really, really make sense. It’s like, paradoxical. Some equal opposite type of shit.” 

Eleanor takes a deep breath, the kind that shakes her ribcage and rearranges all of her bones. It oxygenates her blood, and she thanks the plants for their hard work in making oxygen, just for her to breathe in. 

“Do you think it’d be crazy to show up at his apartment?” Eleanor asks, already rising to her feet.

“I think it’s exactly something that the great and powerful Eleanor Wong would do.” 

“Great, thank you, I love you, sorry I knocked down Pujeetha’s drawing, tell Ben that he still owes me sixty two dollars, bye!” Eleanor shouts, all in one breath, and runs out before Devi can ask her why Ben owes her that much money.

* * *

Paxton’s apartment building is dingy. 

She hates herself just a little bit for thinking that, first thing, when she walks in. especially considering that he is a teacher, just trying to do the best that he can. But she is here regardless, taking leaps and ignoring the dust-choked cobwebs swaying in high up corners.

She finds his door— there is a vinyl sticker of a skateboard stuck next to the apartment number, and it makes a smile settle onto her cheeks— and knocks haltingly. She hears it echo through his apartment and in her heart.

He pulls the door open, his hair dripping water, and he smells like steam out of a shower, his sweatpants clinging to his legs. He does not have a shirt on. She tries not to stare. The sight of him makes her nerves tingle, however, and her heartbeat speeds up in her chest. “Hi,” she says and sounds out of breath to her own ears, “did you just get out of the shower?” 

“Is it that obvious?” he says with a chuckle, and Eleanor’s heart leaps. “Did you want to, like… come in? Or, is the hallway homier than I remember it being?”

“I’ll come in,” she says, and walks in, ducking under his arm, which is still holding the door open.

He lives in a studio: it is a little smaller than her place, with a bed pushed up against one wall. The kitchen and living room bleed into each other, bread wrapped in plastic laying on the kitchen counter and a small stack of newspapers sitting next to the couch. There is a vase with a few dead daisies in it on his coffee table, and his walls are painted a dark blue that is pleasing to Eleanor’s eye. He has a framed photo of his senior year swim team on the wall, and a few other photos with people Eleanor does not recognize, including a blonde girl who is undoubtedly shorter than her, which is a feat.

“It’s kind of a mess, but I’ve been super busy and haven’t really gotten… around to anything. The fridge is mostly empty, but I have some Coke, or, like, Arizona tea,” he offers, and for the first time ever, Eleanor thinks he looks awkward. Like he does not know what to do with her in his home.

“You don’t get a lot of visitors, do you?”

“My sister comes sometimes, but other than that… no.”

“I can tell,” she says, and he furrows his eyebrows, looking at her suspiciously, “not like, in a bad way, or anything. More like you don’t look like you know what to do with yourself with me here,” she hastens to add and watches him relax. God, even his collarbones are handsome.

“Okay,” he says like there is an absence of other available replies.

“I like your apartment,” she says and finds that she means it, despite the clutter and the feeling of the place being anything but permanent, “especially the paint, its a good colour for the home of Paxton Hall-Yoshida.”

He smiles, turning his head in a gesture reminiscent of a side-eye, and Eleanor grins. “Thank you,” he finally says, after regarding her suspiciously for a moment. “Why are you here, Eleanor?”

He asks, pronouncing her name in that fancy British type of way, and before she has completely processed the decision, she is leaning forward, catching him in a kiss. It is awkward, and a little messy, her bottom lip catching more of his chin than his mouth, but the surprised look on his face makes it completely worth it. Completely perfect. 

“Eleanor,” he whispers, reaching a hand up to cup her face, and she is certain that she is looking at him with half-concealed desperation, her eyes blown wide and her lips parted, but it does not matter, because he leans down to kiss her again.

There is shower water clinging to his lips and her skin is only half dry but, fuck, kissing him feels like breathing in the most delicious kind of air, and when he loops an arm around her waist and kisses her harder, she moans into his mouth in a way that would have been horribly embarrassing if he had not pulled away from her and whispered, “fuck, that’s hot.”

She blushes to her bones.

Paxton’s hands slide down her body and he loops them underneath her thighs, lifting her up with frightening ease, and giving her enough time to wrap her legs around his waist before he starts to walk forward.

“Where are we going, Pax?” she asks and then laughs at herself, hiding her face in his neck and kissing at it. She nips at his skin, enjoying the rumble of his groans, and the way it makes her skin heat up.

He stops, and drops her down on his bed carefully, then kneels in front of her, dragging his fingers up and down her thighs, underneath her skirt. “Oh, God,” she whispers to herself, “what are you doing?”

“Looking at you,” he answers and presses a kiss to the side of her knee that makes her entire body feel flooded with sensation, “because you’re, like, really pretty.”

She keens at the praise and knots her fingers in his sheets when he leans forward, lips pressing against her stomach. He pushes her shirt up and kisses over her navel, tongue darting out to taste the skin there, and she groans, resisting the urge to let herself fall backward. 

“Y-You,” she stutters out, voice catching when his teeth graze along her hip bone, “I need you to—”

“To what?” he asks, licking a stripe along the inside of her thigh, and she groans.

“You fucking  _ know _ what,” she answers, and tries not to be annoyed when he chuckles, his breath ghosting warmth over her legs. She combs her fingers through his hair and tugs, listening to him hiss against the pain.

“Tell me,” he says, lips against her skin, and she whimpers. “Eleanor, c’mon, tell me.” 

“Fuck, go down on me,” she says, voice shaking, and closes her eyes against Paxton’s self-satisfied smirk, “I-I need it, please.” 

“Good girl,” he whispers, and grabs her hips, pulling her forward and licking at her over her underwear, pressing his tongue against her center before moving to pull her underwear down, balling them up and tossing them over his shoulder. 

His fingers dig back into her hips when he leans down, licking into her easily and dragging his tongue up, swirling over her clit and sending shockwaves through her body, heavy pleasure that sinks into her bones. 

“Right-right there!” she cries, when Paxton licks back into her and moves his tongue in a way that makes her legs jerk, locking around his head. He does it again, and her back bends, her stomach brushing against his forehead. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” 

He moves one of his hands, pushing her back, then tracing steady circles against her clit, and it is exactly what she needs to come undone. She tries not to be embarrassed when she moans his name, scraping her nails over his scalp, tugging on his hair as he licks against her steadily. 

She pushes him away when she comes down, and watches him as he takes in a deep breath, licking his lips before scrubbing his forearm against his mouth. “Oh, God,” she groans, covering her eyes with one hand, and savouring the darkness for as long as she can. 

“What?” 

“Nothing, just…  _ wow,”  _ she breathes and then jumps when she feels Paxton’s fingers graze against her hips. “Really wow.” 

“Agreed,” he whispers and kisses her stomach. It makes her muscles tense up, and he laughs softly. “You have abs.” 

“It’s the dance classes,” she answers, “and the situps. Probably.” 

“It’s incredibly sexy,” he says, and pulls her skirt off— fuck, it had been rucked around her hips the whole time, and she had not even realized— and circles his fingers around her navel. 

“You really like touching me, huh?” she asks, out of breath and mostly as a joke, but when his fingers trace up her folds, she jerks. 

“I do,” he answers, slipping a finger into her, and she groans her back arching. He gets her there, fast, and it isn’t long before she is fracturing around him, curling her fingers in his bedsheets. 

“Oh, my God,  _ why  _ are you so good at that?” she whispers and then wishes she could take it back at the self-satisfied look on his face. He lets it waver fast, though, and then he is pulling open a drawer in his dresser and rifling through it. He comes up with a condom.

“Do you want to do this, Ellie?” he asks, walking towards her and holding out the condom— he is offering it to her, letting her take the reins, and it makes her heartbeat stutter. 

She pulls herself upright and takes the foil packet, setting it behind her, and looking at him. His abs are not like they used to be in high school, they are softer now, less cut into his body. Molded out of clay instead of carved from marble, and when she runs her fingers over his skin, goosebumps raise in her wake. 

She scrapes her fingernails against his stomach experimentally, and it makes his breath catch, muscles tense. 

“Yeah, I want to,” she says, and hooks her fingers in the waistband of his sweatpants and underwear both, tugging them down at the same time, and trailing her fingers against the underside of his dick. 

_ “Eleanor,”  _ he groans, letting his head fall back when she wraps her hand around him and pumps, watching the look on his face as he works to keep his hips still.  _ “Fuck.”  _

She lets him go, and tears the condom open with her teeth, rolling it on and grabbing his hand, tugging at it. “C’mon, Paxton,” she whispers, and he leans down to kiss her. 

He kisses her hard, parting her lips with his and slipping his tongue into her mouth, hands grasping desperately at her legs as hers slide into his hair, before pulling back before thrusting into her. It makes her gasp, her legs jerking, and she tugs at his hair involuntarily. 

“Shit,” she whispers, wincing— she has not had sex in over a year, and it does not hurt, not really, but the discomfort is enough to catch her off guard. “J-Just give me a second.”

“You okay?” he asks, one hand moving to push her hair away from her face, and he smooths his thumb over her brow. He leans down, kissing her forehead, and the tenderness of the gesture goes directly to her chest.

“Yeah, just a second,” she says and takes a deep breath, thinks of kissing him in his living room, of the way he says her name, and then she nods. “Move,  _ please.”  _

“Are you sure?” 

“Fucking  _ move,”  _ she says, tugging on his hair, again, and groaning. 

He makes a face— the kind he used to make at swim meets in high school, set with determination and looking like a challenge— and pulls out, thrusting back into her quickly. She gasps, eyes clamping shut, and she feels his hands slide down her body. He hooks her legs around his hips and her whole body jerks. 

“Fuck,” she moans, grasping at his hair, fingernails digging into his scalp, and he ducks his head, sucking a hickey into her neck. “Fuck, I-I don’t have concealer, Paxton.” 

“I don’t care,” he says, voice gravelly, and it shoots spirals of pleasure through her stomach. He nips at her skin again, leaving another mark, and her protests catch in her throat as the pleasure tingles into her skin.

He tilts her legs up, the new angle toe-curling good, and her legs shake as he thrusts into her, losing control and moving deeper, snapping his hips into hers. 

“Come on, Eleanor,” he says, and she whimpers, digging her nails into the back of his neck, “come for me, come for me, c-come on, Ellie.” 

“Fuck,  _ Paxton,”  _ she groans, the words acting as a catalyst, and she comes around him, legs shaking. It swirls in behind her eyes and settles in her bones, making her muscles tense up with her release.  _ “God.”  _

He comes after, hips stuttering, and his forehead drops to her shoulder, his breath creating a pattern of heat over her skin. 

“Hey,” she says, nudging his shoulder when she feels his breathing even out, “I need to—” 

“Yeah, yeah, of course.” He moves, easing himself out of her and sitting up, combing a hand through his hair. “It’s the only door in here, so…” 

She gathers her bearings and pulls herself upright, indulging in watching him move around his apartment, tossing the condom away and picking his clothes up off the floor. 

“Hey,” she says, reaching out, and he walks over, standing in front of her. He offers her a hand, and she takes it, using it to pull herself back up. Her legs bump against his, and her shirt falls back over her body. She stands on her tiptoes and kisses his cheek, fast.

“W-What was that for?” he asks, and Eleanor watches a blush spill over his cheeks and down his neck. He has freckles, and that knowledge makes Eleanor’s head spin. 

“I wanted to,” she answers, and snakes around him, grabbing her skirt and underwear off of the ground, and disappearing into the bathroom. 

“Oh my God,” she says to her reflection, eyeing the hickeys on her neck— she did not even realize how many he had left, but there are at least six on her neck, blooming dark purple like violets. She does not even want to  _ look _ at her thighs. 

She goes pee and pulls her underwear and skirt back on, and roots through his medicine cabinet, just to see what he has— razors, aspirin, a box of condoms, empty prescription bottles that she fights the urge to toss out, and a half-empty tube of toothpaste. She shuts the cabinet, satisfied, and opens the bathroom door. 

Paxton is scrolling through his phone, sitting in his bed with his sweatpants back on and a dark red t-shirt that reads  _ James Madison High School Swim Team  _ in blocky white letters across his shoulder blades.

She sits down on the opposite side of the bed, studying his back. He does not even seem to notice when she sits down and the mattress dips, springs squeaking, so she traces her fingers down the dip of his spine, and smiles when he turns around, cupping her jaw and pulling her in to kiss him. “Hi,” he breathes, pulling away. “I have some lowkey bad news.” 

“What?” she asks, moving to kill any hopes she had collected. To try to start hating him. To tell Fabiola that Juilliard-ing everything may not be the worst plan ever.

“I have to go coach swim practice,” he says, eyes slipping closed when she circles her thumb over his temple. Relief fills her mind. “I can blow it off if you promise to keep doing that, though.” 

She clicks her tongue. “No dice, H-Y,” she says and pulls her hands back. He frowns, sticking out his lower lip. “You’re not getting fired because of me, not on my watch.” 

“No fun,” he whispers, but stands up anyway, pulling a mismatched pair of socks out of his dresser and turning to look back at her. “You can stay here if you want.” 

He says it like it is  **small talk,** like a passing inquiry about the weather, and her heart feels like it has stopped like a watch malfunctioning. “Um, I don’t— I don’t have anything,” she says, stammering, “like, clothes, or a toothbrush. And I need to go grocery shopping."

“You can borrow some of mine, and I think I might have an extra—” 

“I have a dog, too,” she adds, “his name is Brighton, I can’t really, like, leave him.” 

“You can bring him here,” Paxton says, biting his lip. He shrugs, then sits down on his bed and pulls his socks on. “If you don’t want to— or don’t want to stay— you don’t have to, though.” 

She thinks of her apartment. Of the broken lightbulb in her hallway and the cracked tile in her kitchen, the stains on the bathroom walls. How much she does not feel like going home and staying there. 

“Okay,” she says, “I’ll stay— on one condition.” 

He raises his eyebrows, and stands up, looking at her with barely contained joy. “Yeah?” 

“We go grocery shopping when you get back.” 

* * *

_ eleanor: ihadsexwithpaxton _

_ devi: i just yelled a very very bad word in tamil  _

_ eleanor: ooo good for you _

_ eleanor: i got off three times in his bed but u can yell in tamil  _

_ devi: are you usually this snarky after u get dicked down?? _

_ eleanor: only when my friend doesn’t pay attention to me after _

_ devi: wait this isn’t our group chat?? why isn’t this our group chat??? _

_ eleanor: because fab is mad at me _

_ devi: you’re mad at each other _

_ devi: just buy her some whiskey or computer parts or a polo or smthn and apologize  _

_ devi: then she’ll apologize too and we’ll all be a happy family again _

_ eleanor: i'll apologize when im dead _

_ devi: ugh _

* * *

“I’ve never really… gone to the grocery store,” Paxton admits, and Eleanor turns to look at him. She had been looking at apples, trying to decide if they would actually eat apples or not. 

“What?” she asks, too bewildered to ask anything else.

“Not since I moved out— I usually just order food.” 

“So you haven’t had a piece of fruit in… six years?” Eleanor asks, putting her face in her hands. 

“I mean, I usually go home for Christmas, and sometimes Rebecca’s husband makes dinners for us—” 

“Oh, God, I am definitely buying these apples,” Eleanor says, grabbing a clear, waxy plastic bag from a roll by the apples, and shaking it open. “Tell me about your sister.” 

Paxton smiles, taking the bag of apples that Eleanor hands him. “She’s smart and fancy and… cooler than I’ll  _ ever  _ be. She works on Broadway.” 

Eleanor falters and turns around to look at him, leaning against the display. “Broadway?” 

“Yeah, she makes costumes,” Paxton says, and shrugs, looking over the heads of the people around them, “oh, can we get kiwis?” 

“Yeah, yeah,” she says, shaking her head, and walking around to push the cart, “totally. Sorry, I just… sorry.” 

“Whoa, what’s wrong?” he asks, standing in front of the cart to stop her from pushing it. 

“Nothing.”

“That’s not a  _ nothing's wrong _ face, that’s a  _ something’s wrong  _ face,” he says, leaning against the cart, and reaching for her hand, “so, talk to me.” 

“This is a grocery store, H-Y,” she says, but takes his hand anyway.

“No better place for impromptu therapy sessions.” 

“Let’s finish shopping first, maybe?” she says, and he looks at her suspiciously. “It’s not, like, an end all be all problem. Just something I’ve been wrestling with for a while.” 

“If you say so, Ellie,” he says, and spins out of the way of their cart, falling in step behind her.

“Just because I like  _ you  _ doesn’t mean I like that nickname,” she says, looking up at him through her eyelashes.

“You seemed pretty okay with it this morning,” he rebuts, looking at the shiny plastic containers of kiwis, and Eleanor blushes. 

“I was distracted.” 

“Mmhmm.” 

* * *

_ eleanor: paxtons sister works on broadway  _

_ devi: ???? _

_ devi: you work on broadway  _

_ devi: also i know that already _

_ devi: im friends with rebecca  _

_ eleanor: wait rebecca rebecca???? _

_ devi: yes. rebecca rebecca. as in rebecca hall-yoshida _

_ eleanor: are you fucking me right now????? _

_ devi: i sure hope not!  _

_ eleanor: oh my fuck _

_ eleanor: why am i incapable of connecting dots??? _

_ eleanor: why didn’t god give me the dot-connecting abilities  _

_ devi: i do not know  _

_ devi: this seems like more of a therapy problem to be completely honest  _

_ devi: i could give you dr ryan’s number _

_ eleanor: i do not need dr ryans number  _

_ eleanor: im just kind of shook rn _

_ eleanor: but i am okay _

_ devi: you should’ve applied to juilliard  _

_ eleanor: s t o p bringing up juilliard  _

_ devi: fine _

_ devi: but at least talk to someone _

_ eleanor: i'll talk to my dog _

_ devi: brighton doesn’t count as someone _

_ eleanor: dogs are people too devi _

_ eleanor: racist  _

_ devi: jfc i need a break from u _

_ devi: love you tho _

_ eleanor: love u too  _

* * *

Paxton forgets all about her upset in the grocery store, and it takes a month and a half for him to ever bring it up again. 

Paxton is grading midterms at his desk and Eleanor is keeping him company, rubbing his shoulders and kissing the back of his deck, making  **coffee at midnight,** when he suddenly swivels around to face her. 

He grabs her hands and kisses both of them. “You never told me why you were upset,” he says, resting his chin on the back of her knuckles, “in the grocery store.” 

All of the embarrassment of that moment floods back into her body, and she feels herself begin to blush. She fights the urge to snatch her hands away from him, and instead she wiggles her fingers, loosening his grip around her hands and cupping his face. She kisses him, and it tastes like coffee. “It wasn’t important.” 

“Yes, it was,” he says, turning his head and kissing her palm, a gesture that makes her heart flip, “you’re important to me. I want to know what was wrong.” 

She takes a deep breath and runs a hand through his hair. “Can we talk about it somewhere else? I might cry, and… I don’t want to cry in the same room where I’m gonna sleep.” 

He nods and looks past her. Sometimes, when he thinks hard, his eyes get glassy, his face still, like he is somewhere else. At first, it terrified her, because the exact same thing happens to Devi when she has flashbacks, and Eleanor has dealt with enough of Devi’s nightmares and panic attacks to know the look. But, when she had asked him, tentatively, if he was okay, he had snapped right back to himself, saying  _ yeah, I was just thinking.  _ Now, whenever he does it, it makes Eleanor smile. 

She pictures his mind like a library, and she wishes that she could explore it. 

“Paxton,” she whispers when he has been quiet for a few moments longer than usual. 

“Yeah,” he says and flits his gaze back to hers, “I know where we can go.” 

* * *

“This is the roof of your building,” Eleanor says, dumbly, looking at the buildings scraping the sky. She used to picture the Empire State Building as a twisty, brightly painted Dr Seuss tower, with clouds floating through it and daisies growing in windowsill boxes. The real thing, however, is a marvel of steel and glass, but Eleanor still catches herself wishing that it was more whimsical. “We’re on your roof.” 

“I used to come up here to throw paper airplanes,” he says, and shrugs, spreading a plaid blanket out on the concrete. 

“That’s littering,” she says, sitting down, and leaning into him when he sits down next to her, tossing a blanket over her shoulder. 

He is staring at the monolithic buildings in the distance when he says, “never thought of it that way.” 

“I’m sure garbage collectors did.” 

“Yeah, probably,” he says, then looks back down at her. His eyes catch the lights reflected all around the city, and traps the colours, and she is almost overwhelmed by an urge to kiss him. She leans in, pecking his lips softly, but pulling away when he nudged at her shoulder softly. “Talk to me, Ellie.” 

“I don’t like that name,” she says, even though she barely means it anymore.

“Talk to me anyway.” 

She sighs, and tears her gaze away from him, staring at the first sliver of pavement on the ground that she can see, watching the cars pass by. “I lied to my friends,” she says, and braces herself for the inevitable, before continuing, “I told them that… that I didn’t apply to Juilliard.” 

“You lied about that?” he asks, and she winces against the question. 

“Yeah. Not only did I apply, but… I got in.” 

“Oh, Eleanor,” Paxton breathes. His fingers squeeze at her shoulder, and it sends a zip of feeling up her spine. “Why didn’t you go, sweetheart?” 

She turns to look at him, her words caught in her throat. She did not know what she was expecting— a barrage of questions, an insult, a harsh truth— but the sympathy and tenderness in his eyes catches her off guard, and her lungs rattle when she breathes in. “My stepmom said she didn’t think I could do it,” she whispers and does not realize she is crying until Paxton wipes a tear off of her cheek with his thumb. “I wanted to be on Broadway, a-an  _ actress,  _ be what my mom isn’t but I-I couldn’t do it. I h-had the chance, and I didn’t— I didn’t take it.” 

“Eleanor—” 

“Do you know how many times I said I didn’t want to-to become my mom?” she asks, rhetorical. “But I’m  _ just  _ like her. I leave people, and I lie, and I do whatever benefits me, a-and I’m a coward. I’m a stupid, f-failure,  _ coward.”  _

“No, you aren’t,” he says, and Eleanor looks up at him, and realizes his jaw is set. He looks steely, angry, almost, but she knows that it is a veneer. He is hurt. 

He is hurt because of her, and the realization makes a sick feeling rise up in her throat. 

“How can you say that?” she asks, pushing his hands away to wipe her cheeks. Someone in a building next door turns a light on, and  **the light reflects off the chain on her neck,** and the golden tones glow against his skin.

“I know you, Els,” he says, “you didn’t lie to hurt them, you lied to help yourself. Sometimes that happens. And… not going to Juilliard didn’t benefit you.” 

“What?” she asks, dumbly. 

“You said you only do what benefits you,” he says, tracing a hand down the side of her face, “if that was true, you would’ve gone to Juilliard.” 

“Oh,” she says, and sits up straighter, looking him in the eye,  _ “oh.”  _

“You aren’t a bad person,” he says, and circles his thumb over her temple, soothing her. “You’re amazing.” 

“You’re amazing-er,” she says, laughing watery, and Paxton smiles, leaning in to kiss her, lips sliding against hers gently.

When he breaks away from her, he whispers,  **“look up,”** and shifts, turning her around to face the same direction as him. “There are a few stars out if you squint hard enough.” 

She looks up,  **and their shoulders brush,** and somehow, out of every touch between them, that is the one that sets off a cataclysmic reaction in her body. 

**No proof,** and just  **one touch, but she feels enough.**

She is in love with him, and the only word she can think to apply to it is  _ inevitable.  _ Loving him is, was, forever will be inevitable, and  **she can hear it in the silence** in between them as Paxton studies the stars and she examines her heart. 

She is in love. 

* * *

The lights in Paxton’s apartment are turned off when they come back downstairs, one of the blankets wrapped around Eleanor’s shoulders, and the other tucked under his arm, and when she looks around his apartment, it feels obvious. 

**She can see it, even with the lights out,** and she wants to close her eyes until the obvious bleeds back into the ordinary. There are pieces of her scattered all over his apartment; high heeled boots and brightly coloured purses and tiny bouquets of flowers, a dog bed and a bowl with a typewriter font  _ Brighton  _ written across it, and she knows that one of his dresser drawers are full of her clothes and that a pink toothbrush sits ready for her in his bathroom. 

She has never done this anywhere else, not with the boyfriends she had in college or even with Oliver, and the realization that Paxton is different makes her head spin. 

**She is in love.**

* * *

She wakes up that  **morning at his place** to the smell of bacon cooking. It startles her, almost, and she jerks awake, sitting upright and looking over the foot of his bed at the kitchen. 

He is standing at his stove, very carefully scrambling eggs in a pan, while bacon cooks in a George Foreman grill plugged into the wall.

“Paxton?” she asks, in a way that makes her voice rise two octaves, and she pushes the blankets off of her legs, “what in the world are you doing?” 

“It’s Sunday,” he says, in place of an answer. Eleanor furrows her eyebrows, and gets up, trudging into the kitchen.

“I might need more details,” she says, wrapping her arms around herself, “it is  _ way  _ too early to think for myself.” 

“My mom used to make breakfast for Becca and I every Sunday morning,” he says, and shrugs, tossing a smile at her over his shoulder, “I kinda felt like doing it.” 

“That’s sweet,” she says, and grabs a spatula that had been sitting on a paper towel, flipping the bacon over with it, “small traditions make me so happy.” 

“Did you have any?” he asks, reaching up into his cabinets to pull plates down, and watching her as she flips the last piece of bacon. 

“Mmm… annual dentist and doctor appointments,” she says, smiling mischievously, “optometrist, flu shots, that sort of thing.” 

“Ellie,” he says, drawing out the  _ ie  _ and pouting, his bottom lip sticking out, and she stands up on her tiptoes to kiss it. 

“We really didn’t have anything special, I promise,” she says, and shrugs, “it’s just not something dad and Sharon value, I guess.” 

Paxton frowns, lips turning down at the corners, upset for real now. “Okay,” he says finally, and shrugs, “then I guess Sunday breakfasts will just have to be a new tradition for you.” 

He says it so easily, and it makes her realization from last night come flooding back. “You don’t have to be nice like that.” 

“What?” he asks, looking at her strangely before turning off the flame on his stove.

“Giving away Sunday breakfasts,” she says, shrugging, and helping him plate the scrambled eggs, “it wouldn’t be fair to you. Or Mrs Hall-Yoshida.” 

“Oh, God, no, her name is Emily, call her that,” Paxton says, and grabs a plastic-wrapped loaf of bread, sliding four slices into his toaster. “And I’m not  _ giving  _ them to you— though you can take them if you want— I’m sharing them with you.” 

“Wait,” she says, turning away from the bacon to look at him, holding one hand up in the air in a gesture that says  _ what?  _ “you’re offering to share a tradition with me?” 

“Yeah, pretty much.” 

“Why?” 

“Because I want to,” he says, raising an eyebrow. 

“Even after everything that happened last night—” 

_ “Especially  _ after everything that happened last night,” he says, stepping forward, and dropping his hands to her waist. She leans into him, however unconsciously. “I like you, Ellie. I wanna share things with you.” 

“Okay.”

“And… my family wants to meet you,” he says, and she can tell she is nervous, can feel it in the picked-up pace of his heartbeat. 

“Okay,” she says, agreeing before she can think about it for too long, and overthink her way out of it. She wants to do it, wants to meet his parents, wants to see if his sister is truly as cool as Paxton says she is. And she wants them to like her. 

“Really?” he asks, disbelief dripping from his tone, and Eleanor snorts, pushing softly at his chest. “‘Cause, you don’t have to agree if you don’t want to.” 

“No, I want to,” she says, nodding, “I want to meet them.” 

He nods, breaking out in a grin, and he is about to say something before the toaster pops, startling both of them out of the moment. The toast is dark brown— way more done than she usually likes it, but if something has to go wrong,  **burnt toast** on a  **Sunday** seems like the best option. 

“That actually scared me, Oh, my God,” Paxton says, and pulls the toast from the slots of the toaster, setting two on each plate. “Oh, also, you’re wearing my shirt.” 

“What?” Eleanor asks, looking down at herself. She has a Sherman Oaks t-shirt on, faded green lettering, and when she looks at the date, she knows that he is right. That, and she is swimming in it, the hem nearly hitting her knees.

“It’s mine— it  _ literally  _ says class of 2022, Els,” he says, and she blushes. 

“Well… it’s mine now,” she tells him, grabbing her plate from his hands and pulling herself up to sit on his counter, spooning some scrambled eggs on the dark brown piece of toast. 

“Okay,” he says, and sits next to her, stealing a kiss before she can take a bite of his food. The domesticity of it— stealing his clothes and eating a homemade breakfast together and sitting on top of the kitchen counters— makes her heart somersault in her chest. 

**She keeps his shirt** and hopes he decides to keep her heart. 

* * *

Paxton’s parents' house is cute. It is brick and bright blue siding, almost Victorian, and exactly the kind of home Eleanor feels Paxton grew up in. There is a skateboard leaning against the foundation and it makes Eleanor smile thinking of him riding it.

“So, this is it, huh?” Eleanor asks standing across from him on the sidewalk, scrubbing her hands against her thighs. 

“You’re nervous,” Paxton says, hands in his coat pockets, “don’t be.” 

“You haven’t really told me a lot about them,” Eleanor says, “and what you  _ have  _ told me makes me seem like… the worst, in comparison to them.” 

“My dad is definitely gonna try to teach you Japanese, and my mom is going to feed you until you physically can’t open your mouth anymore.” 

“What? Why? Is she gonna cook me like the witch in  _ Hansel and Gretel _ or something?” Eleanor asks, and Paxton laughs, tossing his head back. His hair has gotten longer, growing into curls that brush his shoulders when he laughs like that, and Eleanor thinks he is working on a man bun. 

“No, she just likes feeding people,” he says, and shrugs, “but she makes amazing  _ gyoza  _ and  _ harumaki,  _ so I’m not gonna complain.” 

“Neither will I, then,” she says, and  **kisses him on the sidewalk,** indulging in it— the way his hands squeeze her hips and his lips part hers— before pulling away. There's a hazed look in his eyes, a look he only gets after kissing her hard. 

“You can’t kiss me like that before we go in to see my parents,” he says, pressing his forehead against hers, “like, seriously.” 

She laughs at him softly, and tilts her head up for a chaste peck, then pats his cheek. “I won’t.” She grabs his hand, lacing their fingers together, and tugging him down the walk. 

She stops short of the door, looking at the white wicker porch furniture, the morning glories trailing up the siding, an orange cat napping in a porch swing. “Paxton, wait,” she says, tugging him backward, just before he knocks. He stumbles, but rights himself, turning to look at her seriously. 

“What’s wrong?” 

“I… do you think they’ll like me?” she asks, chewing her bottom lip and refusing to meet his eye. 

“They’ll like you a  _ lot  _ more than they like me, probably,” he says, and even though she knows he is joking about them liking her more than him, it makes her feel better anyway. 

“Okay, even though I know you’re lying about half of that statement,” she says, and pushes him back around, letting him knock. 

The door is answered by a girl who has to be his sister. She is too young to be his mom, with a cascade of thin blonde hair and a Santa hat on, wearing a red-striped dress. 

“Hey, douchebag!” she says, and instead of pulling Paxton in for a hug, she slugs him in the shoulder. Paxton shoves her in return, and Eleanor raises her eyebrows. 

“Hey,” Paxton says, hugging her with one arm. “Did you get shorter? I think you got shorter.” 

“And you got dumber. All the chlorine, it’s going to your brain,” Rebecca says, and hugs him back, yanking him down by his sleeve to ruffle his hair. 

“Uncalled for, Becca,” he says, and turns back to Eleanor, “El, this is my sister, Rebecca. Rebecca, Eleanor.” 

“You’re Devi’s friend!” Rebecca says and grabs Eleanor by the wrist, tugging her inside. The house smells like cooking: garlic and hot oil, and a citrus-sweet scent that makes Eleanor’s head spin in the most delicious kind of way. “Mom, this is Eleanor.”

Eleanor’s mom— Emily, Eleanor remembers, her name is Emily— turns around from where she is rinsing soybeans in the sink. She is beautiful, with dark curls of hair and eyes like blades of grass, unrealistically green, and a dress that matches Rebecca’s. When she talks, it is with a lilt in her voice that reminds her of a music box lullaby. “Eleanor! So, you’re the girl that Paxton talks about.”

_ “Mamma,  _ stop,” Paxton says, blushing pink, “talk about you, not able me talking about her.”

“Do you not want me to know what you’ve told your mom about me, Pax?” Eleanor asks, crossing her arms and raising her eyebrows.

Paxton opens his mouth, then closes it. “I am going to go help  _ papa  _ with the TV now,” he says, and turns on his heel, leaving the kitchen.

“Cameron is already helping him, so he’ll either have to third wheel or come out here and face the tiny wrath of Eleanor,” Rebecca says, shrugging, before walking to the sink and resuming the task Emily had abandoned.

“I promise, Paxton only has good things to say,” Emily says, leaning against a counter and smiling down at her— Paxton’s mom is tall, with six inches up on Eleanor, easily, and it would make Eleanor uneasy if Emily did not seem as sweet as she does.

“I’m glad,” Eleanor says, unable to think of anything else, “he’s… pretty amazing.” 

“He says you work on Broadway,” Emily says, turning towards a cutting board with  _ yuzu  _ fruit sitting on it, and cutting them into fourths, “would I know you from anything?”

“Um, I just—”

“She works in the crew, mom,” Rebecca says, taking the soybeans out of the sink, and setting them on top of a folded towel, “she works behind the scenes, like me.” 

“Still! What have you worked on?” Emily asks, taking the soybeans and carefully putting them into a pot of boiling water.

“Right now, I’m running tech for  _ Moulin Rouge!,  _ but the first show I worked on was the, like, three millionth revamping of  _ Cats,”  _ Eleanor says and takes the slice of  _ yuzu  _ that Rebecca offers her. It is tart, like a grapefruit, and Eleanor is a little shocked to find that she likes it. “Is there anything I can help with, Emily?” 

“You’re the guest.” 

“But, I am a guest that likes to cook,” Eleanor argues, and scans the kitchen. Emily is watching the soybeans cook, and Rebecca is sneaking  _ yuzu.  _ There is a circle of dough rolled out on one counter, and a bundle of chives, a bowl of minced meat next to it.

“You can cut up chives if you want,” Emily offers, and Eleanor nods, picking up the knife next to the cutting board and cutting the twine around the chives. 

“Hey,” Rebecca says suddenly, tugging softly on the end of Eleanor’s hair, “did Paxton tell you the story about how he cried at his fifth grade Christmas recital?”

“No, he did not,” Eleanor says, and looks away from the cutting board and the chives long enough to take in the mischievous look on Rebecca’s face, “but I am gonna need to hear it immediately.” 

* * *

“So, Rebecca told me a very interesting story about an incident during elementary school,” Eleanor says, and watches him falter as he brushes his teeth, “about reindeer induced crying.” 

“It was made out of papier-mâché, it was very upsetting,” Paxton says, speaking around his toothbrush, “it had a humanoid face and I didn’t like it.” 

“Sounds  _ extremely _ horrifying,” Eleanor says and leans her cheek against his back. “So, anything you want to tell me about your childhood bedroom before we go in there?”

“There are a lot of embarrassing CD’s,” he says, wiping his face on a towel, and turning around to face her, “and probably a Nirvana poster.”

_ “No.” _

“Yes,” he says, and tips his head forward, closing his eyes, “my biggest shame is that I like nineties grunge.”

“Amazing,” Eleanor says, and grabs his hand, pulling him towards his bedroom door, “last chance for any other embarrassing adolescent memorabilia disclosures.”

“You’ve heard everything I have to offer, Ellie,” he says and holds his arms out.

“No naked lady posters on the ceiling?”

“Ew, no, what the hell, Eleanor?” he asks, sounding borderline offended, “that is almost insulting.”

“It’s a lifelong fear for women everywhere to walk into a man’s bedroom and see a naked lady ceiling poster,” she says, solemnly, then pushes the door open, turning around to survey the room.

It is painted white, the promised Nirvana poster on the wall above his bed, and a drumset in the corner. There is a stack of CD’s and a CD player with a microphone attached, and a skateboard identical to the one in the yard sitting against the foot of the bed. The dresser is covered in stickers with political slogans and the Vans logo. Trophies and plaques from his high school swim team sitting on shelves and hung on the walls. His bedspread has a pattern of 

“This really isn’t as bad as I—” Eleanor starts to say, but is interrupted when Paxton cups her jaw, tilting her face up to his, kissing her breathless. He bites at her bottom lip, and she groans into his mouth, reaching her hands up to curl in his hair, combing out the knots with her fingers. 

Paxton pulls away from her lips, ducking his head and nipping at her ear before kissing the skin behind it, his tongue darting out to taste at her skin, and she moans. “Paxton, what-what are you doing?” 

“It’s not obvious?” he asks and walks her back to his bed, lips wreaking havoc on her neck, and she wracks her brain, trying to remember if she brought any concealer with her when her thighs hit the edge of his mattress, and her knees buckle.

“Fuck, are you sure?” she asks, scooting backward so he can slot his body in between her legs, “because if your parents hear anything—”

“Guess you’ll have to be quiet, then,” Paxtons says, and slides his hands underneath her hips, pulling her to his mouth and licking her over her underwear. She groans, low in her throat, and Paxton tugs her underwear down, swirling his tongue over her clit.

_ “God,”  _ she exhales, tugging on his hair, and bucking her hips towards his mouth, eyes slipping shut as he licks into her, pressing his tongue against that  _ spot  _ inside of her that makes colours swirl and blend behind her eyelids. “Paxton, Paxton I-I’m close.” 

“How bad do you want it?” he asks, pulling away from her to suck a mark into her thigh.

She groans, trying to push her hips towards him, but he moves, pinning her hips to the bed with his hands. “Fuck, really bad, really, really bad,” she answers, and whimpers when he kitten-licks at her clit.

“Beg for it,” he growls, and his words shoot through her body.

“W-What?” she says, brain too fogged to process his demand. 

“Beg me to come,” he says, pressing a kiss to her stomach, before dipping his head back down to suck her clit between his lips, “beg me to come, or I won’t let you come all night.”

She whimpers, and wiggles her hips as best she can, and Paxton pulls away from her, ignoring her whine of protest. “Beg for it, Eleanor.”

He leans down, licking viciously over her clit, and her control breaks. “P-Please,” she says, her eyes slipping shut again, “fuck, Paxton, please, please.”

“You can do better than that,” he says, circling his tongue over her clit, each pass of his tongue against her like an individual bolt of lightning that electrifies her bones and brings her closer and closer to the edge.

“I-I need it, Paxton, I need you to make me come, please, please,” she begs, voice breaking as he licks into her again, his tongue wreaking havoc on her systems, “please, I  _ have  _ to come, I have to— no one can make me f-feel like you, please, Paxton,  _ please.” _

“Come for me, Eleanor,” he growls out, tone low, and hums against her, “come for me, baby, come for me.”

“Fuck, fuck,  _ fuck,”  _ she cries out, forgetting his warning to be quiet, scraping her nails against his scalp. The pleasure shoots through her in waves, making her legs shake and her toes curl, and she moans his name, heaving for breath as she comes down. “God, fuck,” she says, pushing a hand through her hair, and moving to sit up.

Paxton pushes her back down, though, his lips at her hipbone, and she doesn’t try to sit up for quite some time.

* * *

Eleanor wakes up at two in the morning to use the restroom and finds herself staring forlornly at the ceiling when she goes back to bed, trying to go back to sleep. She has never been more thankful for Paxton not being the kind of person who puts a poster of a naked woman on his ceiling.

She sighs, and rolls over, watching him sleep. His face is evened out, relaxed, and the sight of him makes a smile tugs its way onto Eleanor’s lips. Paxton spends a lot of time concentrating during the say, thinking out lesson plans and swim practice drills, and Eleanor realizes now that she has never really seen him relax. 

She reaches a hand out, and traces the line on his face, from his temple to his jaw, and then kisses him softly, right at the spot where his jawline ends. He stirs, though, and she pulls away, looking at him with thinly-veiled alarm. “Hey,” he says, sleep choked and smiles at her. “What’re you doing?”    
  


“I was just looking at you,” she says, smiling at him, and tucking her hand back under the blankets, “I’m sorry, you can go back to sleep, Pax.”

“No, no, it’s okay, Ellie,” he says, and pulls her hand out from under his blanket, placing it back at her jaw. He has a  **strange look on his face,** almost bewilderment, and it makes her smile. “Why were you looking at me?”

“I don’t get to do it enough, at least, not when you aren’t paying attention,” she says, scratching her nails against the stumble at his cheeks, “it’s nice, looking at you when you arent smolder-ing at me.”

“I thought you liked my smolder.”

“I do,” she says, “but I like looking at you when you aren’t trying to impress me the whole time. 

“I…”  **he pauses, and says, “you’re my best friend.”**

His words shoot through her, and she smiles, her lips parting when she leaves forward to kiss him. His lips are chapped, and he groans into her mouth in surprise, but it does not stop her heart from racing. She pulls back and looks him in the eye, the half-lidded gaze that sets her soul on fire, and whispers, “I love you.” 

He pulls back from her, his head hitting his pillow, but his hands come up to cup her face. “You love me?” he whispers, looking at her like she paints the sunrise every morning. “You actually love me?”

“You don’t need to make fun of me,” she whispers, and closes her eyes, too out of energy to look away from him or pull herself out of his grasp.

“I love you, too,” he says, and her eyes snap back open, “I was just… surprised.”

“You love  _ me?”  _ she asks, incredulous, pushing herself to situp, swinging a leg over his hips and leaning down to look at him, to take in his face, see if anything had somehow changed in the moments between his confession and right now.

“Of course I love you,” he says, tracing his thumb down the side of her face, “I just… I can't believe you would love  _ me.”  _

“I realized I loved you almost a month ago,” she says and watches Paxton’s jaw drop, “that night on the roof. I just didn’t want to say it, in case it was too soon.” 

“I realized the third time we went grocery shopping,” Paxton says, “when that guy tried to take the space heater out of that pregnant woman’s cart, and you threw an apple at him.”

“God, I forgot I did that,” Eleanor says, hiding her face in her hands and blowing a raspberry at herself, “maybe I just blocked it out.” 

“It was amazing,” he says, “your aim was terrifying.” 

“It was perfect,” she rebuts.

“That, my love,” he says, tucking her hair behind her ears, and the pet name makes her stomach tingle with emotion, “is why it was terrifying.”

She leans down and kisses him, relishing in the feeling of his hands resting at her waist, and signs into his mouth contentedly.  **He is in love** with her— he holds her heart— and that is all she really needs.

* * *

“Wait, Japanese people actually eat KFC on Christmas?” Eleanor asks, watching Paxton spoon mashed potatoes onto a paper plate with a Christmas tree that says  _ ho, ho, ho  _ on it. “Like, this isn’t just you guys?”

“Nah, my dad ate it every Christmas when he was growing up,” he says, smiling at her over the kitchen island, “it’s not just us.” 

“That's… pretty cool. Usually, people just eat ham,” Eleanor says, and shrugs, turning around to walk into the living room. Paxton stops her, though, with a careful hand at her elbow, and she turns back around to look at him. 

“I have something I wanted to give you,” he says, suddenly serious, and panic swirls into her stomach, “I just didn’t want to give it to you in front of my family, in case you didn’t want it.” 

He pulls out a jewelry box, baby blue velvet, and her heart stop. “Paxton Eito Hall-Yoshida, if that is an engagement ring, I  _ will _ kill you.”

He flushes red, and stammers, setting the box on the counter, “i-its not, oh, my God. I’m not  _ completely  _ insane,” he says, pushing a hand through his hair, “just, open it, please.”

She sets her plate down on the breakfast table and picks up the box, running her thumb over it, before flicking it open. There is a brass house key with her first initial carved into it in a swirling font. A folded note sits above it, her name written on it in Paxtons chicken scratch, and she picks it up, setting the box down.

_ Ellie, _

_ Move in with me? _

_ Check yes or no _

She smiles and looks up at him. “Do you have a pen?”

* * *

_ “Kyabetsu,”  _ Paxton’s father says, and smiles, “that means cabbage— a very important word to me.” 

“Why are you telling her about cabbage,  _ papa?”  _ Rebecca asks, leaning against the doorframe. She is wearing black and white flannel pajamas with a design of snowflakes— they all are, actually. Apparently, the Hall-Yoshida family covets matching Christmas pajamas, and Eleanor had been more than surprised to get to their house two days ago and find a pair for her waiting in the living room. 

“Cabbage is good for you! Good for you intestines,” he says, pointing at Rebecca, “everyone should eat more cabbage,  _ chieko,  _ you included.” 

“I’m good,  _ papa, arigatōgozaimashita,”  _ Rebecca says, and turns to Eleanor, “can I talk to you for a second?”

“Um, yeah, if you don’t mind?” Eleanor asks, looking back at Paxton’s dad.

_ “Itte mo daijōbudesu,”  _ he says, and nods, “go have your secret girl talks. Rebecca,  _ watashi wa, anata o aishiteimasu.”  _

_ “Watashi mo anata o aishitemasu,”  _ Rebecca says back, and motions for Eleanor to follow her up the stairs.

Rebecca’s room makes perfect sense for her. It is pink and black and white, with a dressmaking mannequin in a corner, and her bed centered against a wall with a black stripe pattern, velvety pillows, and a fuzzy throw blanket sitting against her bed. Cameron is laying down on it, his locs splayed out on the pillows around his head like a crown. “I am eighty percent KFC right now, Roo,” he says, and groans when she motions for him to stand up, “this is  _ not  _ good, especially not at this point in my life.” 

“You’re a dork, Cammy, and I think you’re overreacting,” Rebecca says, but helps him stand up anyway, “I love you, but I need to talk to Eleanor right now.”

“I see how it is,” he says, but smiles so wide that Eleanor knows he is not mad, “I’ll go live on in my exile now.”

“You better,” Rebecca says and kisses Cameron quickly. She pinches his butt when he walks out, and the gesture is so surprising that it makes Eleanor yelp with laughter. 

“I’m sorry,” Eleanor says, sitting down in a cushy desk chair with a white faux fur throw hanging over the back of it, “I just… wasn’t expecting the ass pinch.”

“He wasn’t either,” Rebecca says, self-satisfied, and sits down at the foot of her bed, throwing her legs over the endboard. She tosses Eleanor a pillow, and she catches it, leaning down to rest her chin on top of it. 

“So, what did you want? To threaten me over my intentions with Paxton?”

Rebecca makes a face. “What? No, Paxton can handle himself,” she says, and waves a hand, “I wanted to tell you… I work on costuming with  _ Hamilton,  _ and they’re holding auditions for ensemble members because some girls left.”

“Okay,” Eleanor says, trying to keep herself from getting her hopes up, “why’re you telling me.”

“Paxton told me you want to act on Broadway,” Rebecca says, and shrugs, tilting her head to one side, “I figured I would tell you about the opening— and you would already know someone there since you’d be working with me—”

“I’m not… gonna audition, Bec,” Eleanor says, shaking her head, “I’m sorry.”

Rebecca furrows her eyebrows. “Why not?”

“Because, if I told my parents that I was auditioning for  _ Hamilton,  _ my dad would tell me to be more realistic and my stepmom would tell me that it wouldn’t work out.”

“No offense, but that's a bullshit excuse,” Rebecca says, and throws another pillow, this time with force, “you can't do things to try to make other people feel good about your decisions. Your decisions are for you, not for other people.”

“Is that supposed to work?” Eleanor asks, raising her eyebrows.

“It better have worked, because I don’t have any other genius pieces of advice to offer,” Rebecca says, completely honest, and stands up, “now, I have to go drag my husband back in here before he falls asleep in the guest room for the next eighteen hours.”

“Y’know,” Eleanor says, tugging on the end of Rebecca’s braid, “I think in another life, we would’ve been soulmates.” 

“Yeah-doi.”

* * *

_ eleanor: i need you all to not say anything else in reply to this but i am gonna audition for  _ hamilton

_ devi: SO HOW ABOUT THIS WEATHER WE’RE HAVING _

_ devi: I FOR ONE THINK THIS WEATHER IS FANTASTIC _

_ fabiola: AS DO I _

_ fabiola: I AM ALSO GLAD THAT YOURE TALKING TO ME AGAIN ELEANOR _

_ eleanor: ME TOO IM GONNA GO PRACTICE NOW OKAY BYYYYYEEEEEE _

* * *

She shows up at Fabiola’s apartment with a gingerbread house and robot-themed pajamas.

Fabiola tugs open the door, her hair tied up in space buns on top of her head, and Eleanor lets out a relieved breath at the sight of her. “Hi,” she says, and remembers everything that she is holding. She thrusts the gingerbread house in her direction, smiling. “I’m here to make amends.”

“I think you’re off to a good start,” Fabiola says, stepping out of her way and watches her as she carries the gingerbread house to the kitchen counter, “especially if those are robot pajamas. You know I’m weak for robot pajamas.”

“I felt bad about Juilliard because I applied and got in,” Eleanor says, turning around to face Fabiola. Her mouth is parted, eyebrows raised, and she closes her front door.

“I…  _ wow,”  _ she says, dropping onto the living room couch and looking up at Eleanor, “I don’t understand why you didn’t go.”

“Sharon told me she didn’t think I would be able to handle it,” Eleanor admits, picking a gumdrop off of the gingerbread house, “and I didn’t either, I guess. So, I didn’t go. And I regret it, which pisses me off because I  _ hate  _ regretting things. But I do regret it, which means you were right, and I also hate it when I’m not right.”

Fabiola stands up from the couch and runs into the kitchen, sock feet sliding on the tile, and she pulls Eleanor into a hug. “I’m sorry, too,” Fabiola says into Eleanor’s hair, “I’m sorry I kept bringing it up, and that you didn’t feel like you could tell me, and that I— just, everything, I’m sorry for everything that happened.”

“Really?” Eleanor says, squeezing Fabiola’s arms, and pulling her around to look her in the eye, “you seriously forgive me?”

_ “Yes,”  _ Fabiola says, and nods, “I have. Have you forgiven yourself?”

Eleanor blinks, hard, and takes in the look on Fabiola’s face. She’s smiling, just with one corner of her mouth, and it makes Eleanor smile, too. She thinks of Paxton, telling her she is a good person, and of Fabiola forgiving her so easily, and she nods. “Yeah,” she says, “yeah, I think I have.”

* * *

“Are you practicing for your audition?” Paxton asks, unlocking the door to his apartment, and watching her twirl around the floors dramatically. Brighton is watching her from his bed, a blue rubber bone-shaped chew toy underneath his head. “Or are you just spinning around?”

“A little bit of both,” she says, and stops, her skirt swaying against her legs daintily. “You wanna join?”

“Mmm, only if I can slow dance with you,” Paxton says, dropping his briefcase on the ground and walking towards her phone. He changes the music to Fleetwood Mac— one of the CDs on the floor of his bedroom in California— and she snaps her fingers idly to the beat. “And I choose  _ Gold Dust Woman.”  _

“If you say so,” she says, putting her hands on his shoulders and locking her fingers behind his neck. They are swaying back and forth, more juniors at the prom than anything else, but her head is resting on his chest, and she likes the world right there. It feels like  **they are dancing in a snowglobe, ‘round and ‘round.**

“I don’t think I’ve ever been this happy,” Paxton says, into her hair, “y’know,  **I keep a picture of you in my office** at school.”

“I did not know that,” Eleanor whispers, and kisses his chest, over his dark blue button-down, “but I believe it.”

“I’m really, really proud of you,” he says, “and I love you. So much.”

“I love you so much, too.”

He stops swaying, and grabs her shoulders, pushing her back into his eye line. “Are you proud of yourself?” he whispers, concern in his voice. He is looking at her with an abundance of tenderness, and her heart flips in her chest.

She thinks about it.  _ Is  _ she proud of herself? Her dad sounded choked when she told him the news about her audition, and she did not even bother to tell Sharon, unwilling to hear words that might derail her own happiness.

_ Her own happiness. _

She nods, and smiles at him, biting her bottom lip. “Yeah, I am.”

* * *

Her first show as an ensemble member in  _ Hamilton: An American Musical  _ happens on a March day that pours rain.

She dances three shows, chest rising and falling in desperate excitement, and when she takes her final bow, she cries, happy, until her makeup runs down her cheeks, and cries for ten more minutes in the ensemble dressing room.

She stage-doors, signing playbills and taking photos, and when her friends and Paxton wave her away from the crowd, she follows.

Ben hands her a bouquet of roses and hugs her tighter than her corset, and she squeezes at his shoulder blades. Eve asks her to sign her playbill, and Fabiolas gives her a pocket-sized version of Gears Brosnan with the  _ Hamilton  _ logo printed on the top of his head, and Devi whispers, “I’m buying you a cake next week.” 

When they all disperse, Paxton is standing there, looking at her with an unbelievable amount of wonder in his eyes. “I haven’t gotten any reviews from you, Pax,” she says, mostly joking, and knotting her hands in the lapels of his jacket, smiling up at him.

“Marry me,” he says, his hands skating down her waist to rest at her hips, “marry me, Eleanor.”

“Why?” she whispers before she can stop herself. 

“Because, I-I don’t ever want to spend my Friday night doing anything but watching you perform, ever again. You’re my best friend and my hero and I want to spend  _ forever  _ with you,” he says, kissing her hands, each individual knuckle, “meeting you, I…  **I understand now why they lost their minds and fought the wars,** and I want to marry you.”

She nods, tears blooming in her eyes, “Yeah,” she says, still nodding, “yeah, I wanna marry you. I wanna marry you, Paxton.” 

“You wanna marry me?” he repeats.

“Yes, I want to marry you,” she says, and grabs his hands, kissing his knuckles this time, savouring in his smile.

“We’re gonna get married,” he says, giddy, and Eleanor feels her like her blood is carbonated, champagne bubbles swirling in it, Cleopatra’s priceless pearls dropped in wine. 

“Yeah,” she says, breaking into a smile, “yeah, we are.”

He leans down to kiss her, and  **she can hear it in the silence and see it with the lights out,** but something, everything in the world feels much more obvious.

**They are in love.**

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading. If you like the fic, leave a kudos, and if you really love it, leave a comment, as they make my cat respect me. Thank you so, so much!


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